Tag Archives: UK property

How to make renting attractive in the UK

Central banks have been busy saving the West from its own excesses since the great financial crisis of 2007, but in the process, they have made housing unaffordable for young people, particularly in the UK.

House prices have surged in many UK cities, with record low interest rates and money printing making homes more affordable for “investors” and less so for those who actually need them as places to live in, as opposed to assets to speculate on.

Despite record low mortgages and various subsidies, homeownership is increasingly unaffordable for a rising number of people.

The consequence is deepening inequality, which makes the UK look more like a feudal, rather than modern, society.

One of the ways to tackle the so-called “housing crisis” would be to make renting an option perhaps as good, if not better, than buying a property.

Here are four ways in which the UK government could go about making renting a truly affordable option for young people in the UK – and a few of the reasons why it will never do it.

Continue reading →

The UK should stop subsidising house prices post-Brexit

Forget Covid-19 and Brexit. The question to which most people in the UK would want an uncertain answer is what will happen to house prices in 2021.

Continue reading →

Fight obesity with less office work

UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson seems keen to please one set of traditional Tory voters – landlords – even if this could mean putting the health of thousands of office workers at risk.

Instead, he should use his creativity to turn some of the now-obsolete office spaces into ways to fulfil a more important pledge he made not long ago: fight obesity. And not just his own.

Continue reading →

Subsidise workers, not property speculators

UK chancellor Rishi Sunak seems to be trying to build for himself the image of a man who is not afraid to “tell it like it is” when the situation requires it. But his actions show that he is prepared to sacrifice long-term economic development for a short-term boost for his Conservative party.

Continue reading →

The UK government must tackle housing, not Brexit in 2018

This year, the UK government must come up with solutions to the main crises that eat away at some ordinary Britons’ well-being. One of these is the housing crisis, which continues unabated despite the billions of pounds thrown at the problem.

Continue reading →

As home prices hit record levels, negative equity looms

A statement from Halifax shares the “good” news: home prices paid by first-time buyers are the highest ever.

In the first half of this year, first-time buyers paid on average £207,693 for a home, the highest price on record. This is 4% higher than a year ago, and 50% higher than five years ago.

Continue reading →

Banning letting agency fees for tenants is just a PR stunt

The announcement by Chancellor Philip Hammond in his Autumn Statement that letting agency fees charged on tenants will be banned has been met with cries of outrage from estate agents.

Their rage is in part justified. Lately, they have been asked to do much more administrative tasks than simply running credit referencing checks. They are also supposed to check immigration papers as well, to ensure that prospective tenants have the right to be in the country in the first place.

Continue reading →

UK buy-to-let tax reform should not be reversed

The new chancellor of the UK, Philip Hammond, will present his first Autumn Statement on November 23. There are hopes in certain quarters that he will reverse a plan by the previous chancellor to stat phasing out tax relief on interest rates for buy-to-let mortgages.

If he does reverse it, he will make a big mistake with dire consequences down the line. The previous chancellor, with various governmental programs such as Help to Buy, had already blown up a real estate bubble — helped of course by loose monetary policy and a flood of cheap money from abroad.

Continue reading →

How a ‘hard Brexit’ could burst the London housing bubble

It looks like I was right when I said the UK was heading towards a hard Brexit. And after all, why not — it’s what’s people have voted for, even though few realise what this means.

The banks are already making plans to shift some jobs out of London into other EU capitals and the French government, usually considered anti-big business, is rolling out the red carpet.

There are some who say “good riddance” to a sector where all sorts of governance scandals have dominated the headlines since the crisis and into which UK taxpayers have had to pour billions to keep it afloat.

While it is true that bank bailouts have cost the taxpayer a lot, a diminished banking sector in the city of London would almost certainly trigger a crash in house prices, which in turn could start a recession.

Continue reading →

Bank of England loses inflation target

Well, it was only a matter of time, really.

Central banks’ credibility has been eroding bit by bit for a while now, but the first evidence that the public’s expectations about inflation are disconnecting from those of the policymakers emerged on Thursday.

Continue reading →